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A review by jessica_
Neon Ghosts: A Witch's Sin by Daniel B. Greene
3.0
I really enjoyed the first half of this book, an easy 4 stars- possibly 5 stars.
The world was immersive, the setting interesting, and I was really enjoying the characters and their relationships.
It is easy to see how much Daniel Greene has improved since the publication of his first book.
I’m not used to sci-fi but the technology and different levels of the superstructure that the population lives in to protect the poisonous haze in the outside world really drew me in. The initial introduction of a particular virus was very interesting to me vampires :)
I adored how advertisements were pushed on everyone, to the point that an open window was used as consent for a drone to come into your home to try and sell you products
I love the talk about the failed terraforming of Mars, class structures, and how different the levels of the megastructure operated. Overall, the world building was one of my favourite aspects of this book
________
But around the halfway point, things took a turn. It was like being reintroduced to a new story. There was a lot of exposition to explain the new thing introduced, conversations felt repetitive, and the plot lost a lot of interest for me.
Then once I got used to this first change, the story changed again and more exposition was needed before we settled into another new normal. It was like there were three different stories in this book.
With my investment lacking, I started to notice little issues that hadn’t bothered me in the first half- the most notably being jokes about how people bypassed government restrictions to get weapons/modifications… giving the feeling that the only way to stop a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun.
And thats setting aside my longstanding issues with vampires being depicted as an oppressed class.... I try to overlook it whenever it's depicted in shows/books but the more the plot brings up laws introduced to subject a group of super strong, dangerous creatures, with a demon whispering in their ear, that when they go on a rampage actively kill people. it's just not a good allegory for real world issues. Especially when they say thing like Vampires don't bite kids :/
Character interactions no longer felt natural and were used as more exposition to move the plot along, lacking the genuine feelings from the first half.
The characters voice in the second half all start to sound the same. They all talked, texted, cursed the same way regardless of their age, upbringing, or motives. With no distinct voice.
The villains we’re cartoonishly evil and I really just stopped paying attention :(
Other issues arose from how little consequences the protagonist faced but I need to go into spoilers for that one so in this cyber punk inspired story advance tech and enhancements are very important. Vampires are not compatible with these enhancements so when the main character is turned -not only is her soul saved by a witch, so she don’t have a demon whispering in her ear, and her frenzied state won’t be as bad as a normal vampire transformation-She is given a suit that has better modifications then she had before leaving her no reason to learn a new way to fight or alter how she lives in this world….. also while I’m talking spoilers… Why turn the main character into a vampire in the last third of book 1??? Isn’t that like a book 3 plot line?
Regardless that the second half of this story wasn’t to my personal taste I am excited to see what he publishes next, and will happily support his career going forward... happily awaiting for my physical copy as it looks beautiful :)
The world was immersive, the setting interesting, and I was really enjoying the characters and their relationships.
It is easy to see how much Daniel Greene has improved since the publication of his first book.
I’m not used to sci-fi but the technology and different levels of the superstructure that the population lives in to protect the poisonous haze in the outside world really drew me in. The initial introduction of a particular virus was very interesting to me
I adored how advertisements were pushed on everyone, to the point that an open window was used as consent for a drone to come into your home to try and sell you products
I love the talk about the failed terraforming of Mars, class structures, and how different the levels of the megastructure operated. Overall, the world building was one of my favourite aspects of this book
________
But around the halfway point, things took a turn. It was like being reintroduced to a new story. There was a lot of exposition to explain the new thing introduced, conversations felt repetitive, and the plot lost a lot of interest for me.
Then once I got used to this first change, the story changed again and more exposition was needed before we settled into another new normal. It was like there were three different stories in this book.
With my investment lacking, I started to notice little issues that hadn’t bothered me in the first half- the most notably being jokes about how people bypassed government restrictions to get weapons/modifications… giving the feeling that the only way to stop a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun.
And thats setting aside my longstanding issues with
Character interactions no longer felt natural and were used as more exposition to move the plot along, lacking the genuine feelings from the first half.
The characters voice in the second half all start to sound the same. They all talked, texted, cursed the same way regardless of their age, upbringing, or motives. With no distinct voice.
The villains we’re cartoonishly evil and I really just stopped paying attention :(
Other issues arose from how little consequences the protagonist faced but I need to go into spoilers for that one
Regardless that the second half of this story wasn’t to my personal taste I am excited to see what he publishes next, and will happily support his career going forward... happily awaiting for my physical copy as it looks beautiful :)